


Into the Grey

by breakthecitysky



Category: Southland
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-30
Updated: 2013-10-30
Packaged: 2017-12-30 23:31:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 403
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1024685
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/breakthecitysky/pseuds/breakthecitysky
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ben, on becoming a cop, and on Cooper.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Into the Grey

**Author's Note:**

> This is barely long enough to require a summary. Nothing specifically spoilery herein, just a couple of images from U-Boat that I couldn't get out of my head. A coda to 2x03.

He sees it, every once in a while, in his image, reflected against glass. Across a restaurant, in the tilt of someone’s head. Who he was to be, in another life, the man he didn’t become. 

Sitting on the curb, watching shoes twist in the wind, he wonders about the man that he is. And then there’s Cooper. Cooper, who always seems to come when Ben needs him, asked or unasked. Cooper, who is perhaps more responsible for the man he’s becoming than anyone else in his life, past or present. 

He sits there, arms over his knees as he listens to Cooper’s particular cadence, the rhythm of what he’s saying more comforting than the words. Their knees brush once, twice. It’s not charged, except for how it is. 

The thing is, Ben thinks, the thing is that over the course of their time working together Cooper has been a little of everything. Part brother, a very little father, mentor, antagonist, partner. Friend. Those are all loaded words, each of them with their own carefully wrapped baggage and he’s not entirely sure he’s ready to unpack all the ways in which those roles interlace with one another to make something more. 

So he just watches, a little while longer, thinks about the way the lights of the fire truck highlight the lines in Cooper’s face, somehow both gentling and more severe. 

“You can’t save everyone,” Cooper says, and Ben knows that’s right. 

It still takes everything in him though, not to turn and say, “Yeah. But you saved me.” 

He doesn’t, though. He’s not ready yet. Instead he walks over, gratefully accepts the sneakers from the firemen who look at him with slightly bemused expressions. Rookie, he knows they’re thinking, someday the shine will wear off you, too. 

Maybe that’s true, maybe it will. Cooper still shines though, maybe a little tarnished but Ben wouldn’t be the kind of cop he is now if he hadn’t seen what it means to walk that line on a daily basis, bad cop, good cop, real cop. 

He tucks the shoes just inside the front door, rolling his eyes at the little smirk on Cooper’s lips as he crosses the street. 

“What?” he asks. 

Cooper just barks out a laugh in response, shaking his head. “Beer?” 

“Beer,” Ben nods, lips quirking up. 

No, he can’t save everyone. But maybe he and Cooper can save each other.


End file.
